The Children of Green Knowe
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
The blurb: L. M. Boston’s thrilling and chilling tales of Green Knowe, a haunted manor deep in an overgrown garden in the English countryside, have been entertaining readers for half a century.
There are three children: Toby, who rides the majestic horse Feste; his mischievous little sister, Linnet; and their brother, Alexander, who plays the flute. The children warmly welcome Tolly to Green Knowe… even though they’ve been dead for centuries.
But that’s how everything is at Green Knowe. The ancient manor hides as many stories as it does dusty old rooms.
And the master of the house is great-grandmother Oldknow, whose storytelling mixes present and past with the oldest magic in the world.
My review: This is a classic from the 1950’s. Before reading the book, I had read a few reviews that compared it to The Secret Garden.
This book didn’t do much for me. In fact, it annoyed me greatly.
It was a spooky type fantasy story, with ghosts of children from many years past visiting a child from the present. There were lots of wild animals and birds that came right up to people to be fed (this was the bit that really got to me) and then the story just ended. I didn’t feel as if there was a plot or a satisfactory ending.
Obviously, things have changed over the last 55 years and the kids of today would expect more – not to mention the publishers. I believe this was a good “what not to do” experience.